Security grid tightened in Kashmir ahead of PM Modi’s Drass visit

SRINAGAR: Security grid across the Kashmir valley has been tightened ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Drass on the occasion of the Vijay Diwas on Friday, 26 July.
Prime Minister Modi is scheduled to attend the Vijay Diwas ceremony at Drass, the first highway township from Kashmir in the Union Territory of Ladakh, on Friday. He is scheduled to arrive in Srinagar by an aeroplane and proceed to Drass, in the district of Kargil, by helicopter.
On 26th of July every year, India pays tributes to over 500 soldiers who laid the supreme sacrifice of life while pushing back hundreds of the Pakistani intruders and recapturing the border territories occupied by the Pakistani troops in 1999.
The war, which began in the first week of May 1999, ended after the Indian security forces neutralised and pushed back the last Pakistani soldiers on 26 July 1999.
For the first time in recent years, security and intelligence agencies are apprehending some terror activity on the Vijay Diwas “anywhere in Jammu and Kashmir, but most likely in the valley”, sources said. They revealed that the agencies had seen recently clicked pictures of at least one group of the battle-hardened terrorists, all in the NATO-troops like battle gear equipped with highly sophisticated telecommunication equipment, cameras and M-4 American assault rifles.
Some of such pictures, according to well-placed sources, have been taken in the background of the poplar trees which are endemic to the Kashmir valley. “It is for the first time over the years that a group of 9 heavily armed terrorists has been spotted anywhere in the valley”, said a source who believes that notwithstanding the killing of several intruders, some of them have been successful in reaching the forest areas of Kupwara and Baramulla districts.
Significantly two unidentified but apparently Pakistani terrorists and one non-commissioned officer of the Army have died in an encounter in Kupwara’s Lolab valley in the last 48 hours.
On the 8th death anniversary of the Hizbul Mujahideen poster boy Burhan Wani, terrorists carried out a deadly strike and killed five soldiers of the Indian Army on 8 July 2024 in Jammu’s Kathua district. “Usually nothing significant has occurred on Vijay Diwas in the last 25 years but this year all precautions are being employed to foil a terror strike around this day”, said the official source.
Officials believe that in view of a series of attacks in Jammu, particularly after 9th of June 2024, there were some apprehensions of a terror activity this year. Because of these apprehensions, cordon and search operations, checking of vehicles and frisking of commuters is likely in certain areas including in the capital city of Srinagar.
Usually the forces remain on high alert in the first fortnight of August every year in Kashmir. While the over seven week long Amarnath Pilgrimage concludes in the same fortnight, ceremonial parades are held at all Divisional and District headquarters on occasion of the Independence Day on 15 August.

Updated On 7/25/2024 12:23:25 AM

Comment on this Story